THE OLD NEIGHBORHOOD

It won’t be too long before people refer to Manhattan as the “old neighborhood,” and visit it nostalgically like Italians to Bensonhurst and Jews to the Lower East Side1. Like both those ethnic enclaves, the people, shops, and character of yore are being supplanted. This has been going on all across our city, and cities everywhere, for the last century. Unfortunately when it comes to Manhattan, there’s no real desire to go back for nostalgia tours.

Oh well, for a limited few who were here for it and for those just curious about LIC’s past, we’ll be featuring photos of the former Pepsi plant on the East River taken by local photographer and artist Nick Knight2. It was demolished in order to make way for TF Cornerstone’s development of towers with jaw-dropping views of the Manhattan skyline. While that city is great to look at from a distance, when it comes time to going out, these days I’d rather head up to Astoria.